


Our love

by cristallodineve



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Boyfriends, Breaking Up & Making Up, Coming Out, Coming of Age, Eating Disorders, M/M, Slice of Life, Trainee Era
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-24
Updated: 2018-12-29
Packaged: 2019-07-01 21:21:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15782367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cristallodineve/pseuds/cristallodineve
Summary: Baekhyun enters SM as a trainee, and there, he met Park Chanyeol. Canon AU.





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

> So, this has been in the back of my mind for a long while, but I couldn’t find a way to put it down that fully satisfied me. I know canon AU isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, and to be frank it is not mine either, but for some reason I was literally dying to write this. These two men’s relationship, whichever its nature might be, is really beautiful, and this is just a work of fiction, even if I did a little bit of research on interviews and other miscellaneous stuff to make it more realistic. Of course, though, I cannot know how things work in the entertainment industry and in their real lives omg, so this has to be considered my personal take on the matter. The story is told from Baekhyun’s – my fictional version of Baekhyun, at least – point of view, and it follows them from their trainee days since the present times (prepare for a long ride, lmao). Please remember that English is not my first language and that I don’t have a beta, so be kind to me. I don't usually ask for comments, but I'm curious to know what you think of this.  
> Thus said... enjoy.

Baekhyun was dragging its feet. Suddenly, he didn’t feel as confident as that morning, when he jumped awake in his bed, electrified by the thought of starting his trainee program at SM.

“What’s wrong, sweetie?” his mother asked him, panting slightly. She had been carrying the lighter suitcase of the two Baekhyun brought along, after parking her car a lot far from the building. She looked smaller than usual, under the bright sun, and Baekhyun wondered when his pretty mom started changing into a middle-aged woman.

“Nothing” Baekhyun replied, smiling. He didn’t want to burden the woman further. She had been driving for the whole night to accompany him to Seoul, and she had dark circles around her eyes. Baekhyun felt sorry for her. “I’m just so excited.”

She looked relieved by his answer. “I wish you lot of luck, my son. Come here, hug me.”

Baekhyun happily complied, crushing her in a killer hold. His mother giggled. “Thank you for everything, mom. I mean it.”

“I love you. And remember: you can do it. You’re special.”

Baekhyun blinked back the tears. “Yes.”

With his two suitcases in hand and his heart heavy, he said goodbye to his mother and walked into the big and slightly intimidating building. He boldly walked towards the bored receptionist. “I’m Byun Baekhyun.”

“Okay...?” she replied, eyeing in a not-so-subtle way his clothes. Maybe designer jeans and tee were too much?

“I’m here to train” he explained, beaming broadly. The woman looked through a binder on her desk, and Baekhyun noticed that she searched for his name in an awfully long list. His heart dropped a little at that sight. Did it mean that there were so many boys willing to become singers?

She handed him a key. “Eight floor, room six. You can put your stuff there, here’s the key of your locker, don’t lose it. The company doesn’t take responsibility over personal items left outside of the locker and stolen.”

“S-stolen?”

The woman, a girl in her thirties, shot him a glance. “Happens a lot, unfortunately.”

Baekhyun grabbed the key and started climbing the many stairs that led towards the dorm rooms. The building was split in two parts: the lower floors were occupied by a gym, a small swimming pool and some practice rooms for dancing or music training. In the middle floor there was a big canteen, that sadly reminded him of his school, and what he supposed could be an infirmary. The dorms were at the higher floors, and there was no elevator.

When he entered the right corridor, he spotted a guy leaning against the wall while typing furiously on his cell phone. He was tall and slim, and his face was really peculiar, with oblique almond-shaped eyes and a big, straight nose. He was so handsome he looked like an actor. “Hello, I’m Baekhyun” he introduced himself with a smile, bowing down in the most polite way.

The other guy stared at him in confusion, but bowed as well. “Huang Zitao” he replied, with a surprisingly soft, even slightly feminine voice. The contrast between his looks and manners was really strong.

“Are you Chinese, Zitao? Can you tell me where is my room? The person at the entrance told me but I can’t remember the number.”

Zitao stared at him in bewilderment, and from his panicked frown Baekhyun realized that he shouldn’t be that fluent in Korean. He internally cringed, trying to picture how tough could be training away from your home, in a completely foreign place where you couldn’t even fully grasp what you were being told. “Uhm, don’t worry, I’ll ask someone else” he said, patting on the Chinese boy’s shoulder. “See you later.”

Zitao smiled and nodded apologetically, waving at him, and Baekhyun walked some more, reading the number on the plates. Thankfully enough, a group of people showed up from the bottom of the corridor, coming towards him. They were six boys, all wearing tank-tops and shorts, probably coming straight from the gym, and from the way they were talking they looked all Koreans. Baekhyun brightened up at the sight.

“Hello, I’m Byun Baekhyun. Nice to meet you.”

“Oh, yes, the new kid” a boy said, stepping forward to bow and shake his hand. “I’m Kim Joonmyeon.”

“Leader-hyung” a very young boy, practically still a child, snickered in the back. Baekhyun stared at him in awe: he looked like the perfect flower boy, with delicate features and graceful limbs.

“Don’t pay attention to Sehun. I’ll introduce you to the others: Kim Jongin, Do Kyungsoo, Park Chanyeol, and he’s Seho Youngho, we just call him Johnny.”

Baekhyun tried his best to retain all those names and faces, but he found out that he couldn’t. They were all too pretty to look at them properly. Two of them were really tall – as in, almost intimidatingly so – and he suddenly felt ugly, in his jeans and Converse trainers. He tried guessing which of them were singers, and which dancers, and he suddenly realized that those people, who had trained for longer than him, must all be better than him.

Thankfully enough, Joonmyeon did his best to make him feel at ease. While the other boys let themselves fall on the floor, dozing off or playing with their phones, he showed him the lockers and the closet with the foldable duvets for the futons (the boys slept one next to each other in a quite small room, and they were supposed to take care of their own bedding putting it back on the closet after using it in order to gain some space during the day). Soon, Baekhyun realized that he brought too many clothes along, and that his stuff wouldn’t fit in the tiny locker.

“This could be a problem, actually” Joonmyeon sighed, scratching his head. “Many of us had their stuff stolen or thrown in the garbage, lately.

“Oh, God, why?”

“Well... competition is very hard, especially when you are talented. People get envious.”

“Stop, hyung, you’re scaring the newbie.” The pretty boy called Sehun nudged with his bare foot at Joonmyeon’s calf. “Don’t worry about that. If someone ever targets you, our leader hyung will take care of everything.”

“You make me sound like some sort of police...”

“He helped me a lot in the beginning” Sehun added, ignoring the comment and standing up to hug the older boy from behind. He acted very affectionate, Baekhyun thought. “There was this Taiwanese guy who hated me and always threw my shoes on the street, leader hyung confronted him and he got expelled from the company for improper behaviour.”

Baekhyun blinked. “Wow” he murmured, scared and admired at the same time. “That’s amazing.”

Sehun nodded knowingly. “Don’t hesitate to ask him for help. And even if I’m just a kiddo, I’ll be more than happy to help you too.”

Baekhyun smiled. “Thanks. Well, I’ll just pack and send back home some of my stuff, then.”

Joonmyeon nodded, approving. “Did you already take your preliminary body check?”

“Uhm, no.”

“Okay. You need to get downstairs at first floor and ask for Doctor Wang. Without her certificate, you won’t be able to attend dance, singing and training class.”

“I see. Thank you for the info.”

“Also... can I give you a little advice? Please don’t take it too personally, though.”

“Sure.”

Joonmyeon looked sheepish. “I think it would be better to refrain from using your suburbs’ dialect, when you talk, otherwise they’ll make you take additional classes to fix your speech. Sorry” he added, noticing Baekhyun’s perplexed face.

“It’s alright. I didn’t think it could be a problem.”

“Here, _everything_ is a problem” Sehun darkly commented from the floor where he was still sprawled.

In the end, even if he was still drenched in sweat from his recent training and looked exhausted just like the others, Joonmyeon led him towards the infirmary. Now Baekhyun understood why Sehun called him leader: he was responsible, calm and acted very mature for his age.

Joonmyeon waited for him outside while a female doctor wearing a white coat escorted him into a small room. There, she asked him to undress and made him stand on a scale.

“You’ll need to lose some body fat” the woman said, draping a measuring tape around Baekhyun’s thighs.

“Really?” he marvelled, “I thought I was in good shape... I did hapkido and other sports...”

“Being in good shape is a thing, being good for the entertainment industry is another. I’ll give you a diet plan.”

Baekhyun gulped, glancing at his reflection in the full-length mirror. He saw a pale, thin and scared boy, still stark naked. Losing weight would make him look prettier? He had no idea, to be honest. All the boys in his dorm room looked thin, almost unhealthily so.

“Also, would you be okay if the company ever asked you touch up your eyes, nose and chin?”

“My...” he started repeating, but he managed to stop just in time not to sound like a parrot. “Well, I guess it might be good for me?”

“To improve your image, yes” the woman confirmed, looking pleased with him. “Your face has potential, but if you could do something for these heavy eyelids and these chubby cheeks, I think it would be way better. Maybe, though, we could wait a little and see if the weight loss will make your face thinner too. I think it might” she added, poking at his cheekbones. “My, my. What a pretty bone structure. And your mouth has such a lovely shape. We’ll need to bleach your skin, though.”

Baekhyun  shivered. He wasn’t against plastic surgery, but he found a little upsetting the thought of looking at himself in the mirror only to found a stranger staring back. Also, the woman kept praising his bones and his looks, but he felt strangely objectified, almost mortified by her compliments. He had been there for hours, and nobody asked him to sing yet. How could looks be more important than talent?

“You know, doctor... I really want to succeed” he murmured.

The doctor ruffled his hair. “You’re a good boy. Here, stick to this diet plan for two weeks and do some extra cardio, then come to see me again.”

Baekhyun bowed, got dressed and left after taking the papers the doctor gave him. Joonmyeon fell asleep on a chair while waiting for him, and Baekhyun could easily see the bluish veins on his porcelain forehead. He looked utterly exhausted, and he felt bad when he had to shake his shoulder to wake him up. “Oh, how did it go?”

“It was okay, I guess. I’ll just need to... uh... eat just protein shakes and lettuce for the next two weeks.”

“Ah, I know how it feels, my body gains weight at crazy speed. I’m perpetually on a diet.”

“Geez, must be tough.”

The other shrugged. “You get used to it, after a while. It’s for work.”

 _It’s for work_. Baekhyun kept repeating those words in his head all day, while Joonmyeon accompanied him during the various classes they were supposed to attend. First, they gathered in a big room, where a person showed them a terribly articulated choreography, and the boys were supposed to repeat it after just one look. One of his roommates, Kim Jongin, laughed during Baekhyun’s turn. “You are so cute, your bones are so flexible that you look like a mollusc while you dance. Your arms flail everywhere!”

Baekhyun didn’t know if that was supposed to be a compliment, but he chose to smile and thank the other boy who, he soon found out, danced like a god. “That’s Kim Jongin for you” Sehun whispered in his ear while they watched him perform, “he’s our dancing ace. I’d give my right arm to be half as good as him.”

Compared to Jongin, Baekhyun felt clumsy and ugly.

Afterwards, finally, they took a singing class, and finally it was Baekhyun’s time to shine. After he finished warming up, he sang a complicated vocalise, making everybody’s mouth gape open and clap. “Wow, Baekhyunnie, you’re so good” Sehun commented. “I’m shit at singing.”

Baekhyun really liked the younger boy’s attitude. His voice, which was still changing, sounded like a frog, but the boy didn’t refrain from doing all their vocalises, repeating the most difficult ones until his voice didn’t crack. He was tenacious, and his “I-don’t-give-a-f” attitude was just an attitude, after all.

After an exhausting afternoon, the boys went eating at the canteen, which was already crowded and filled up with starving young men. Baekhyun stared at the lettuce leaves in his plate, but he noticed that none of the others were actually eating rice, just low calories meals, exactly like him. Joonmyeon was slowly munching on an apple, trying his best to make it last.

While the others took a shower, crowding all together in a steamy bathroom, Baekhyun decided to follow doctor Wang’s advice and go into the gym for some extra cardio training. He ran some laps on the treadmill, but he soon felt exhausted and stopped. Maybe it would be better to venture into the dance room to practice the choreo he messed up previously. That comment from Jongin, even if not entirely malicious, still burned a little.

He went downstairs, but when he approached the room, he noticed that the lights were still on, even if it was already past midnight. Was there somebody else training? Interesting.

He silently entered the room. A boy he didn’t know was immersed in a complicated choreography and was checking himself in the mirror. The techno music was loud, but it barely covered the sound of his pants and the sliding of his shoes on the linoleum floor. Baekhyun kept staring for an awfully long while, hypnotized by the boy’s swift and smooth moves. He didn’t have Jongin’s elegance, but his style was really personal, and Baekhyun liked it. How could he be so good? The way he danced was unreal.

Now he wasn’t so sure he wanted to practice in the same room of that genius.

He grabbed his bag, preparing to go. In that moment, though, the dancer saw him. He was panting mad and sweating all over, so Baekhyun handed him the water bottle he just got from the vending machine in the corridor. “Here. Take it.”

The boy looked at the bottle, then raised his eyes and shot him a sharp glance. “Are you going to practice?” he asked, and the coldness of his voice made Baekhyun cringe.

 _Bad move, smartass_. “Uh... err... no. I was just--”

“Then, please, get out.”

Baekhyun couldn’t believe what was going on. The boy turned his head towards the mirror, resuming his staring at his reflection. He flexed a slender and muscular arm, carefully studying the wrist’s movement. He was completely ignoring Baekhyun, who for some reason felt way more humiliated and guilty than he should.

“Okay. Uhm, sorry.”

He slided past the door, dashing in the corridor. _Fuck, fuck, fuck_. He had tears in his eyes and couldn’t understand why. He wanted to go home, he wanted his mom to hug him. Why was everyone so uptight and horrible in that place? He wasn’t used to that kind of attitude. In his hometown, everybody smiled and was nice to newcomers. There, he was just seen as a potential enemy.

He got lost again, wandering around empty halls, until he found a door leading to a balcony. Relieved, he pushed the door open and leant his arms over the banister, breathing in the polluted air.

“I can do it” he murmured, but his voice sounded tiny and child-like in the traffic’s noises coming from the street. “I can do it for real.”

“Hey. Having a bad day?”

Baekhyun turned and saw one of the boys who roomed with him. Joonmyeon introduced him just like all the others, but he realized, not without any shame, that he couldn’t remember his name. “Oh. Uhm, hello.”

“It’s tough, at the beginning” the other stated, “but it gets easier after a while.”

He stepped into the light, and when Baekhyun saw his smile something happened to his guts. He had been about to cry, and now he really was in trouble. He didn’t want to bawl in front of a stranger like a loser. “Yeah” he murmured, unsuccessfully trying to sniff without getting caught.

The other guy came even closer. He was really tall, standing of a good head higher than Baekhyun. “It’s alright” he said, “I won’t tell anyone, don’t worry.”

Baekhyun’s throat was too tight to let out a proper reply, but he appreciated it. “I spent my first night here on the phone with my mom, crying my eyes out” the boy went on, “and the day after everybody was making fun of me.”

Baekhyun gasped in horror.

“Don’t be like that. They’re okay, it was me who was overreacting. Have you already got to know the Chinese trainees?”

Baekhyun furtively wiped a single tear falling from his right eye. “I think I met one of them in the practice room a little while ago.”

The other boy beamed. “Oh, that must have been Yixing, he likes practicing alone at night. He’s great, isn’t he?”

“Well, as soon as he saw me he told me to get out...”

The boy laughed aloud. His laughter was pretty contagious, and Baekhyun found himself smirking along. “Now that I think of it, it’s pretty funny, isn’t it? He looked so annoyed with me!”

“I swear Yixing is a nice guy. Just, next time, talk to him when he’s not practicing. He tends to obsess a little over his dancing, sometimes.”

“A little” Baekhyun commented, staring at the lights underneath. Even Seoul could be pretty, at times. “What were you doing here, by the way?”

“Me? Oh, nothing in particular. I just needed some alone time, I guess.”

“Just like me” Baekhyun agreed. They stared together at the street, and for some reason the silence falling between them didn’t feel awkward or heavy.

“I’m really sorry” the boy said after a while, “but I really don’t remember your name.”

Baekhyun burst out laughing. “What’s so funny? I’m terrible with names.”

“I can’t remember yours as well” Baekhyun admitted, “and  I kept walking in circles because I didn’t know how to ask you without sounding like an idiot.”

“Did you just call me an idiot? Don’t make that face, I’m joking. It’s Chanyeol, by the way... Park Chanyeol.”

“Byun Baekhyun.”

They bowed to each other, and finally Baekhyun resolved himself to look into Chanyeol’s eyes, which were big, dark and very pretty. That dude was going to become famous, one day or another. He had the looks of an idol.

“Nice to meet you, Baekhyun. And I’m glad to see that you are probably feeling better, now.”

Baekhyun smiled, and they started talking. For once, he didn’t feel the need of being circumspect, of keeping in check what he was letting out of his mouth. He let his accent show, and he didn’t feel ashamed of it since Chanyeol seemed okay with that. Chanyeol was funny, smart and – even if the word sounded wrong for a guy – very sensitive. Baekhyun couldn’t find any other term to define the way he approached him, noticed his distress and gently comforted him, without sounding paternalistic or superior. While they talked, he learnt that he had an older sibling, just like him, an older sister called Yoora, and that his parents were divorced. His mother owned a restaurant, and he told him to have dinner there once because the Carbonara was killer.

Baekhyun could have listened to his deep voice and stared at his beautiful eyes for ages.

“It’s getting late” Chanyeol said after a while. “We should sleep a little, otherwise we won’t be able to endure it tomorrow.”

“Okay” Baekhyun agreed. Chanyeol showed him the way towards their room, and while they fumbled with the keys, they met another trainee in the corridor.

“Goodnight Yeol” the boy called Yixing whispered, sporting a damp cloth on his shoulder. He must have danced until then, and he looked utterly exhausted. “Oh, and you. Sorry for before, I have been rude, haven’t I?. Thank you for the water, by the way. I was going to look for you and apologize. I’m glad I’ve met you out here, this way I didn’t wake anyone up unnecessarily.”

Baekhyun blinked. He felt like it wasn’t the same guy of before, but his gentler twin. “Uuh, it’s okay. I was just a little startled, that’s it.”

Yixing smiled, and Baekhyun noticed that he was extremely handsome too. “We could practice together next time, if you want.”

“I’m not as good as you, but I’ll be glad to.”

“What did I tell you?” Chanyeol whispered, after Yixing waved at them and disappeared into another room, “he’s okay.”

They got rid of their shoes and entered the room, being careful not to step onto anyone of the sleeping boys, who were all rolled up in their duvets, snoring softly. “Where the heck have you been?” Sehun croaked, while Chanyeol laid his bed next to his.

“Quiet, quiet. I was just on the balcony.”

“You and your balcony” the boy grumbled, before curling up into a tight ball and hiding his head underneath the pillow.

Chanyeol winked to Baekhyun, making him smile again, and then made room for him to lay his bed next to his. Baekhyun changed into his pyjamas in a flash and then slid under the covers, trying not to stare at Chanyeol, who discreetly turned his back to him to get changed as well. He was so tall that his legs and arms almost seemed too long for his body, which tended to look a little ungraceful, but even if his eyes weren’t trained, he could easily foresee the way his shoulder would have broadened and his proportions would get just perfect in a short while.

He couldn’t wait to hear him sing. He was sure that his voice was beautiful.

“Sleep tight” Chanyeol whispered, laying down on the futon facing him, “tomorrow is going to be tough.”

“Thank you for today” Baekhyun awkwardly murmured. “I mean it. Thank you.”

Chanyeol didn’t say anything. He yawned, and then smiled and closed his eyes, and something, maybe in the way his brow smoothened out, or his cheek got squished against the pillow, made Baekhyun’s heart leap.

 _Park Chanyeol_ , he repeated to himself, while closing his eyes. _Park Chanyeol_.

Even his name was so beautiful.

Just later, when he was about to fall asleep, he remembered about a thing. Why was Chanyeol alone in the balcony, that night? Was he doing something like making a call, maybe? But he didn’t have his cell phone along. Could it be that he felt lonely and unhappy, just like him, and went looking for some solace?

Baekhyun didn’t know. But in that dark and crowded room, that even smelt lightly like used socks, he suddenly felt close to that guy, close in a way he never really felt to anyone else before.


	2. Two

The day after, he woke up with a jump. Someone was shaking him, and for a moment he couldn’t recognize where he was.

“Did I startle you?” Sehun snorted, and then sniffed and rummaged for a tissue in his pocket. “Jongin and me are going for a run, would you like coming with us?”

“Okay” Baekhyun agreed, even if he still felt tired and would have rather stay in bed for longer. He hunted for clothes and shoes in the darkness, careful not to step on the still asleep bodies on the floor. Chanyeol was snoring softly next to him, arms thrown to a side in a weird position, and Baekhyun found himself glancing towards him while he got ready. His feet were bony and obnoxiously big, and they peeked from under the duvet, the toes long and all curled up. That sight, for some unknown reason, made him smile.

Outside, the air was crisp and cold. Baekhyun picked up the brisk pace of the other two boys and started running, feeling the soreness in his muscles. None of them talked much meanwhile, but he felt strangely close to Sehun and Jongin while exercising and gasping together for air. They ran a few laps around the block, but then Jongin’s left thigh started cramping and they just walked back slowly after a quick stretching break. “I keep having problems” the boy told Baekhyun meanwhile, “it’s the dance training. I’ve done jazz and ballet before, but I don’t know, something about these pop classes is too hard for my joints. I injured myself so many times I’ve lost count. I wish I was as flexible as you!”

Baekhyun shrugged. “I did hapkido back in my hometown, maybe it’s because of that.”

He still felt uneasy when people criticized him, but for some reason compliments made him feel even weirder. Nobody ever questioned his joints before, but now he even got praises for them. That place was just so strange. Sometimes it felt like he stepped right into another world, whose rules were still hidden.

While he took a quick shower, he peeped at his fellows’ bodies. Jongin’s back was sculpted, every muscle slender and perfectly definite under the tanned skin, while Sehun, even if still boyish, hid a big surprise down under (Baekhyun actually had to avert his gaze quickly when he saw how big he was, because he felt all his blood rush towards his face when he realized what he was staring at). Compared to them, he felt ugly and insignificant, and he ended up staring at his feet, watching the water droplets collect in the drain.

The morning exercise made him hungry, but according to his diet plan he wasn’t allowed to eat anything until eight in the morning, and it was still early. So he returned to the room to get dressed, where he found the other boys rolling out of their duvets and blinking their crusty eyes. Chanyeol’s hair were so big it formed a crest on top of his head, and he giggled when he saw that.

“Don’t laugh at me” the boy pouted, “I am sensitive in the morning.”

“Sorry” Baekhyun apologized, but he kept laughing softly until Chanyeol smirked along. They got ready and then headed to the canteen to grab their small breakfasts (Baekhyun had the feeling that his stomach had been replaced with a bottomless pit during the night) and then their day finally began. Dance class, speaking in public practise, vocal training. This time, though, the tutor wasn’t the same of the day before, and Baekhyun didn’t get praised. The woman who was training them, an ex opera singer who was fairly famous before injuring her vocal chords and ending her career in theatres, scolded him for his posture and misuse of diaphragm while expressing sound. “Straighten your back” she shouted, interrupting his vocalise, “lift your head. You look pitiful, all hunched up like that.”

She forced him to sing high notes, and Baekhyun felt uneasy because he felt more comfortable in lower ranges. The woman had a stick she used to point out notes on the whiteboard on the wall, and she sometimes used it on them. Baekhyun personally saw her swatting on the back a boy he didn’t know because he wasn’t keeping it straight enough for her liking. After that, he felt so tense he couldn’t sing anything properly, and his voice came out strained when he tried. He trembled when the teacher came closer to him, brandishing her intimidating stick, but then she just tapped it on the floor before pointing out his mistakes.

“Is she allowed to do that?” he asked the others when they were eating, much later. “I mean, isn’t it kind of... unethical?”

“It is” Yixing replied. Now that the misunderstanding between them was clarified, he and his gang hung out with him and the others a lot. “But everybody does that. Let’s say it’s unethical but kind of socially accepted too?”

“That’s crazy” Baekhyun sulked.

“It’s to push our limits. We cannot improve, if we never experiment beyond our comfort zone.”

“So it’s not enough being good at something?”

He wanted to become an idol because he was told a lot that he was good at singing, and because he loved singing as well. Now he felt as if he got it all wrong. Not exactly regretting becoming a trainee, but pretty close. Still, he didn’t want to go home yet. He had the terrible feeling that if he came back after such little time, he would get mocked and bullied for being a failure.

Yixing patted his shoulder and handed him a low calories snack bar, which Baekhyun grabbed and wolfed down. “Keep a stash of these in your bag” the Chinese advised. “They have the same calories of half an apple, but they are much more filling. And they are packed with good proteins.”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t worry. You’ll get used to it!”

Unfortunately enough, though, Baekhyun’s body seemed to disagree. His last weight check, in fact, confirmed what he already understood by himself: that he loved food too much, and he wasn’t tall enough to justify a high calories intake per day. Was he really bound to spend his life feeling hungry then? Apparently, for being a successful singer you needed to be skinny. Once he witnessed something really terrifying while exercising in the gym. Baekhyun was spacing out, looking towards a trainee he didn’t know and thinking that he looked so fucking fit, when the boy’s eyes suddenly rolled back and he crashed on the floor like dead. When he rushed towards him, he cringed when he noticed how skeletal his wrists and fingers were.

“Sometimes, I feel scared” he confessed to Chanyeol much later. After showering, the taller one, which hadn’t been around Baekhyun for the whole day, but instead hanged up with Kyungsoo and Joonmyeon, kind of ignoring him, suddenly asked him if he wanted to tag along, and Baekhyun accepted.

They were on the balcony again, and it was a windy night. Chanyeol was wearing a hoodie, and his long fringe kept flying in his eyes. “I know that feeling well” he admitted, staring down at the street. “Sometimes I still ask myself if I should just quit.”

Baekhyun looked at him. “Really?” He found that statement rather surprising. He always thought that Chanyeol naturally belonged to that environment, and that he looked chill and at ease, and even a little amused at everybody’s struggles. Sometimes, he even thought his confidence was a little scary.

“It doesn’t look like that.”

“I have always been good at hiding things.”

Chanyeol ducked his head, biting on his lower lip. Baekhyun thought that he looked conflicted. “Is there something I can do to help you?” he offered.

“Not really. But thanks.”

They both kept silent after those words, staring down, both lost in thought. “Do you have any siblings?” Chanyeol suddenly asked.

“Uh, an older brother. Baekbom.”

Chanyeol’s mouth curled into the littlest smile. “And is he as talented as you? Can he sing?”

“I’ve heard him sing just once, when he was too drunk to act cool” Baekhyun tried to joke, but he didn’t like the way Chanyeol’s cheeks got flushed while he talked. And he definitely, definitely didn’t like the tears gathering in his eyes. “You?”

“I have an older sister” Chanyeol whispered, “Yoora. She’s amazing.”

Baekhyun looked at him worriedly while he gulped down. “Chanyeol, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”

“And your parents?” Chanyeol insisted, sniffing up and ignoring the question. “Are they... good people?”

“Of course they are” Baekhyun replied, more and more confused. “They are my... Chanyeol, please, don’t.”

While he talked, Chanyeol started tearing up. The angry, frustrated kind of tears, those you usually keep bottled up for nobody to see. “Sorry” he apologized, “I can’t hold on anymore. You can leave, if you think I’m annoying...”

 _As if_ , Baekhyun thought. As if he could ever leave like nothing while he was in pain like that. What was he supposed to do, though? A hug was too intimate, something only close friends could do.

“What happened to your family?” he dared to ask.

“Oh, nothing too exotic. My parents divorced.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“It was such a cold shower! They never, never fought when I was around – not a single time. But apparently they couldn’t stand living under the same roof anymore. What did I miss? Why did I never notice the signs? Was I so self-centered that I never fucking realized?”

“Do the others know?” Baekhyun softly asked. He was about to suggest Chanyeol he could talk it out with Joonmyeon and ask his help to contact the agency management, maybe he could get some days off or whatever, but the boy unexpectedly snapped.

“No, and I don’t fucking want anyone to know!”

Then, as if suddenly realizing that he overdid, he let out a ragged sigh. “I didn’t mean to yell. I am so sorry I’m burdening you with the stupid little story of my life” he said, angrily wiping a stubborn tear with his palm, “but really, this is driving me crazy. My mom keeps saying she’s alright, but she looks so... I don’t know, she looks so out of it. As if this isn’t even her own business, as if she never met dad and they are nothing but strangers. And maybe it’s just like that? Fuck. And dad, he has never been busy like in these last few days. He barely answers his phone, and just for a few moments. My sis doesn’t know what to think as well, I feel so lost.”

Baekhyun silently approached him. The rage fit of before had turned into a full-fledged crisis, and Chanyeol’s eyes kept leaking. “I really shouldn’t cry” the boy went on, still stubbornly wiping the tears away from his cheeks one by one, “I really shouldn’t, since I’m a privileged boy who got to enter a prestigious company and is currently training to become an idol... and during the day, since there’s so much to do, I usually manage to collect myself and forget about all this. But then, at night, I can’t ignore the feeling that my life, along with my family, is really going nowhere...”

And he started sobbing, loudly enough to make Baekhyun’s heart break. He reached out and patted Chanyeol’s shoulder, feeling the nervous muscle beneath.

He didn’t try offering him a comforting speech, his pain was too obvious, too raw to be handled with simple words. He kept touching him reassuringly, soon switching to stroking his back gently. He let him cry his eyes out until he looked ugly and puffy, and for all the time he stayed with him without judging and trying to unnecessarily lecture him. There was something that elicited his compassion, in that big guy who looked so cool but kept crying like a small kid. The truth was, the more he saw of Chanyeol, the more he wanted to know about him. He was sure he was much more of what he could see on the outside.

“Thank you” Chanyeol murmured in the end, when he finally managed to calm down. “I really needed to vent, you know.”

“I’m glad you are feeling better” Baekhyun replied, “I just wish I could be of more help.”

Chanyeol shook his head. “You’ve been great.”

And after that, silence fell again between them, but strangely enough, it wasn’t uncomfortable at all. Baekhyun and Chanyeol just leant on the balcony, both lost in thought, enjoying that kind of closeness that comes from sharing something big. Words weren’t necessary.

The morning after, every trainee who was sharing the room with them noticed a shift in the atmosphere, because since that moment, Chanyeol and Baekhyun became inseparable.

\---oOo---

They would talk a lot, of course. They were both gamers, and sometimes they discussed about that topic or went to the arcade together, but soon Baekhyun found out that he could talk about basically everything with Chanyeol. Not because the tall boy was a very good listener (which he wasn’t, because he was too easily distracted and could change topic at light speed) but because they surprisingly clicked well together. They liked the same things, and there was something about the way Chanyeol talked, reasoned and voiced out his thoughts that made Baekhyun agree with him immediately. Soon, the others started teasing them. “So, where did your best friend go?” and “Chanyeol, did you lose your Siamese twin or what?” were the jokes most frequently used, and even if he didn’t have any problem with Chanyeol, sometimes Baekhyun found it a little uncomfortable, because it had a subtle-not-so-subtle gay-shaming undertone that bothered him.

Being all males living together, gay jokes were pretty popular among the trainees. Usually it was just innocent teasing between comrades, but Baekhyun witnessed a few episodes when someone was being brutally bullied and nobody took a step forward to help because defending the victim would have ignited another round of torment.

Truth was, Baekhyun had a secret, a secret he didn’t tell anyone, not even his older brother or his mom, whom he loved and trusted more than anyone in the whole world.

Sometimes, when he looked at someone, the word “pretty” would cross his mind, just like that, out of the blue. And it wouldn’t be such a problem, if that happened only with girls, even if that could be bothersome enough. The real thing was that it happened with boys too, and more than just once or twice.

It happened with Sehun, frequently. With Joonmyeon, who had polished, classical features and an unblemished skin. With Jongin, while he stretched his legs and his graceful thighs flexed under Baekhyun’s eyes. But with Chanyeol, it happened all the freaking time.

Baekhyun tried hard to ignore that feeling. It was wrong to think that way, but he didn’t have control over his mind. Those thoughts would take form at the most random times, like while they were sweating at the gym, when they were immersed in class and he was (or thought he was) deeply focused in learning the dance moves, when they were outside on the balcony talking about other things. Sometimes, Baekhyun managed to shrug it off and act philosophical: Chanyeol was a handsome boy, period. Anyone could say he looked pretty, when he was all dressed up or when he kept his long fringe away from his face. It was way weirder, though, when he caught himself staring at Chanyeol, all gross and sweaty, coming out from the sauna, or when he couldn’t tear his gaze away from him while he did very trivial and uninteresting things like eating, doing his makeup, filing his nails. Baekhyun blamed it on his teenager’s hormones, and never spent too much time thinking about it.

Once, though, while he was having dinner with the others, he spotted a trainee he didn’t know talking softly to another boy sitting next to him, and when he checked, he noticed that they were holding hands under the table, staring at each other.

He averted his gaze immediately, blushing madly as if he saw something forbidden. Love between men... could it happen for real? Could it be an actual _thing_? Since that day, those thoughts haunted him, keeping him awake at night.

What if his affection towards Chanyeol wasn’t completely fraternal? And what it he, Baekhyun, was... a homosexual? Of all things?

To be completely honest, though, he thought that Chanyeol was very handsome even on that day, when their bond was born. He remembered it very well.

While Chanyeol cried, he felt the strong urge to reach out and soothe him.

Because, even in that state, he looked absolutely _beautiful_.

\---oOo---

The day Kim Jongdae joined the company, Baekhyun learnt the true meaning of the word “jealousy”. The hard way, kind of.

Jongdae was a cheerful boy with a charming smile and a pretty face. Baekhyun found him quite agreeable to keep around, until he opened his mouth during singing practise. After listening to his voice, Baekhyun felt doomed.

Kim Jongdae was the fucking best singer he ever met. He could do everything – high notes, low notes, middle range, he could do _anything_ – but above all he always looked comfortable. He never let pressure get at him, he never lost his composure and attitude. He looked perpetually unbothered and sure of himself, and Baekhyun, for maybe the first time since he became a trainee, was shamefully, totally envious of his talent.

“You shouldn’t be” Chanyeol advised him later, when they went outside to grab a bite. They were both supposed to be on a diet, but noticing that Baekhyun was depressed, Chanyeol decided to treat him some tasty food. “He’s very good, but all he has is technique. I can’t feel anything, when he sings. With you, it’s different. You are very expressive. And I’ve already told you that your voice colour is great.”

“Thanks” Baekhyun grumbled, shoving the scorching hot rice cake in his mouth, “I know it’s childish, but I can’t help it. I feel like a snail, compared to him.”

“Please” Chanyeol laughed. “Shall I start listing all the things I like about you? Would that help in making you feel better?”

Baekhyun swallowed. It was happening again... all those random thoughts. _Gosh, he’s so sweet_. Also, that night, he was looking especially good. He had tied his long hair in a small half ponytail on the back of his head, and Baekhyun was particularly fascinated with the baby hair hanging messily around his forehead. Sometimes, he had to clasp his fists in his lap, because the urge to reach out and tuck them behind his ears was almost overwhelming. “Maybe” he murmured.

 _Or maybe not_.

“Hmm, let’s see” Chanyeol began, with a sly smile. “You are cute and small, quite the flirty type. You sing beautifully. You are a fast learner and you are quick-witted. You dance well. You are good at remembering the moves. You can play piano, which I envy a lot. You are good at school. You are funny. You are...”

“Okay” Baekhyun whispered, “now stop.”

Chanyeol stared at him, realizing about his uneasiness. “Did I say something wrong?”

Slowly, Baekhyun shook his head no.

“Then, why are you looking like this?”

 _Because_...

He was about to tell him, to spill everything. _I think I have feelings for you_. But he could not say it aloud, right? Boys didn’t act that girly. He suddenly remembered the two boys in the canteen, though, and he blushed.

“Sorry” he whispered. “I’m so sorry, but I don’t think it’s right to lie at you.”

“To lie at me...?” Chanyeol repeated, confused. He wasn’t understanding, and Baekhyun suddenly felt small, pathetic and lost.

Or maybe, the right word was _lonely_. As if he never fully realized about his utter loneliness, until he met Chanyeol.

“I’m so sorry, Chanyeol, to burden you with all this” he said, “but I think I like you.”

A terrifying silence followed that statement, and Baekhyun stared at the food, feeling the burn on his cheeks and an awful urge to run away and hide forever. He half-expected Chanyeol to stand and walk away in disdain, or worse in disgust, so at first he was nothing but confused when he raised his gaze and found out that the taller boy was still there, staring at him blinking his eyes.

“I see” Chanyeol said, “so I guess I should give you an answer, shouldn’t I?”

Baekhyun’s mouth dropped agape. He would have never expected anything like that. To be honest, he half expected Chanyeol to take it as a joke... but now, he was _considering_ it.

So, did that mean that he had a concrete possibility?

“I-if you want... y-you’re not compelled...”

Chanyeol smiled at him. “Aw, don’t stutter. It’s okay.”

“Really?”

“Really. Just give me a couple days, okay? It’s a pretty big news to digest.”

“I guess so” Baekhyun agreed, but seeing Chanyeol smile did something good to his heart, making it feel somewhat lighter. And lighter Baekhyun actually felt, as if he shrugged a heavy weight away from his back.

“Thanks for being honest to me” Chanyeol added, “I appreciated it.”

This time, Baekhyun could just nod and smile lightly, because he felt choking. It was happening again.

 _You are beautiful_.

“I’ll head back first.”

Baekhyun stayed put, while Chanyeol stood and walked away. Before leaving, he went to the owner of the stall and paid for their meal, as he always did, and Baekhyun was left alone.

He strolled around the block for a while, trying to calm down. Did he just do what he actually did? Confess to a guy? That was just crazy. He just hoped he didn’t ruin their friendship, but the way Chanyeol calmly accepted his confession made him believe everything would be okay. Even if he would get a negative answer, as he half-heartedly expected, Chanyeol was honest and good-mannered enough to let everything slide and keep going as if anything happened. The real question was, would Baekhyun be able to shrug it off in that case?

He returned to the dorm very late, because he wanted to make sure that Chanyeol already went to bed, and there he was, all sprawled on the floor like a giant puppet. He smiled, sliding into his futon trying not to bother anyone, and when he laid on the thin mattress, he found himself staring at him, at his beautiful face, his big eyes that never fully closed, even when he slept.

 _Don’t be delusional_ , he told to himself, in a desperate attempt to keep his feet well grounded on earth, _he’ll say no_.

But never, never like in that moment, he wished for that no to be a yes.


End file.
